March 17 will soon be upon us and wannabe leprechauns will be downing Guinness green beer and perhaps reading Dr. Seuss’ Green Eggs and Ham, following the long-held tradition practiced in the small town of O’Neil, Irish capital of Nebraska.
Like so many of our holidays that find their origins in the sacred, they’ve been masked in frivolity.
Nothing wrong with festivity, mind you. It would just be nice if we knew why we were celebrating, instead of empowering revelry to eclipse significance.
Take Saint Patrick’s Day, for example. It’s celebrated in recognition of Ireland’s primary patron saint, Patrick, known for establishing some three-hundred churches and spreading Christianity throughout “The Emerald Island” during the 5th century. Saint Patrick’s Day is observed on March 17, as this is the supposed date of Patrick’s death.
Author Philip Freeman, who earned his Ph.D. in Classics and Celtic Studies at Harvard University, writes, “What we know of Patrick’s life comes only through the chance survival of two remarkable letters which he wrote in Latin in his old age. In them, Patrick tells the story of his tumultuous life and allows us to look intimately inside the mind and soul of a man who lived over fifteen hundred years ago.
“We may know more biographical details about Julius Caesar or Alexander the Great,” suggests Freeman, “but nothing else from ancient times opens the door into the heart of a man more than
Patrick’s letters. They tell the story of an amazing life of pain and suffering, self-doubt and struggle, but ultimately of faith and hope in a world which was falling apart around him.”
Here’s a guy that was snatched away to Ireland from his home in Britain by Irish pirates, at the impressionable age of sixteen.
“For six years he endured brutal conditions as he watched over his master’s sheep on a lonely mountain in a strange land,” explains Freeman. “He went to Ireland an atheist, but there heard what he believed was the voice of God. One day he escaped and risked his life to make a perilous journey across Ireland, finding passage back to Britain on a ship of reluctant pirates. His family welcomed back their long-lost son and assumed he would take up his life of privilege, but Patrick heard a different call. He returned to Ireland to bring a new way of life to a people who had once enslaved him.”
Patrick’s enslavement turned out to be a blessing in disguise, however. Writing in his autobiographical Confession, he acknowledges the time he spent in captivity was critical to his spiritual development, eventually leading him to convert to Christianity.
Patrick describes his transformation, “I was like a stone lying deep in the mud. Then he who is powerful came and in his mercy pulled me out, and lifted me up and placed me on the very top of the wall. Although I am imperfect in many ways, I want my brothers and relations to know what I’m really like, so that they can see what it is that inspires my life.”
Freeman believes what made Patrick successful was his “dogged determination and the courage to face whatever dangers lay ahead, as well as the compassion and forgiveness to work among people who had brought nothing but pain to his life.”
“None of this came naturally to him, however. He was a man of great insecurities who constantly wondered if he was really cut out for the task he had been given. He had missed years of education while he was enslaved in Ireland and carried a tremendous chip on his shoulder when anyone sneered, as they frequently did, at his simple schoolboy Latin.”
Like the prophet Moses, who spent some forty years as a shepherd in the wilderness and, by his own admittance, was “slow of speech and of tongue,” Saint Patrick accepted his leadership position reluctantly. As you may recall, Moses didn’t have the greatest résumé to become God’s spokesperson, having been raised as a prince of Egypt while his fellow Israelites labored as slaves.
“Given to fits of depression, self-pity, and violent anger, Patrick was not a storybook saint, meek and mild, who wandered Ireland with a beatific smile and a life free from petty faults. He was very much a human being who constantly made mistakes and frequently failed to live up to his own Christian ideals, but he was honest enough to recognize his shortcomings and never allow defeat to rule his life,” observes Freeman.
You don’t have to be Irish to admire Patrick. His is a story of inspiration for anyone struggling through hard times in a world with unknown fears and trepidation lurking around the corner. One could conclude the holiness of a person is known only by the fruits of his or her work.
So raise a glass to the patron saint of Ireland, but as you do, know the man behind the celebration.
Former Cook County Commissioner Garry Gamble is writing this ongoing column about the various ways government works, as well as other topics. At times the column is editorial in nature.
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